A program that allows pharmaceutical companies to give the Food and Drug Administration millions of dollars each year to make the drug-approval process faster should not be eliminated because of problems with reform legislation.
For five years, the pharmaceutical industry has paid special fees to hire 600 extra workers so the FDA could cut in half the time it takes to approve new drugs.But the program expires in September - at the same time the Clinton administration wants to cut the FDA's regular budget by $68 million. As the FDA's budget is debated, it only makes sense for Congress to reauthorize the user-fee program for another five years.
The FDA gets about $820 million from Congress every year to oversee consumer safety. The Clinton administration wants to cut $68 million and raise the difference by boosting user fees paid by the companies the FDA regulates.
Though the drug companies are willing to fork over fees to safely streamline the approval process, the federal government should not put an even heavier burden on those companies to fund the agency's operations. That would be unfair.
Cutting the FDA's budget would make it necessary for private researchers to take a larger role in the testing of new drugs. Provisions in the legislation to overhaul the agency would allow review by industry-paid private companies of more than 90 percent of the nation's medical devices and let food companies advertise that their products have health benefits based on preliminary reports by scientific groups.
The FDA is not an organization whose activities should be overseen by outside agencies, especially private companies. Letting the fox guard the henhouse could be dangerous for consumers.
It's appropriate and even expeditious for the FDA to accept money in user fees from pharmaceutical companies as long as the federal agency maintains control over the drug-approval process. Now is not the time to cut the FDA budget or let the user-fee program expire.